It has been dismissed as the niche domain of hipsters who don’t even
have turntables and nostalgic dads buying countless reissues of Dark
Side Of the Moon. But the resurrection of vinyl has been given major
label backing, with the announcement by Sony Music that it will restart the manufacture of its own records.

The Japanese arm of Sony Music announced it would open its own
record-pressing plant in March next year to cope with the huge demand
for vinyl in the country.

Sony MusicJapan shut down its in-house vinyl pressing production in 1989 after the
advent of CDs, which entered the market in 1982 and were dominantfor the
next two decades.

However, in a trend mirrored worldwide,
vinyl sales in Japan have rocketed over the past four years and the
country’s sole vinyl-pressing factory is unable to cope with demand,
prompting Sony to step in. It is a similar story in Europe, where most vinyl for major and independent labels is pressed by just two plants, GZ media based in the Czech Republic, and Record Industry in the Netherlands.
However, their combined capacity of more than 100,000 records per day is
not enough to keep up with global appetite.

“It’s actually too good,” said Record Industry’s owner, Ton
Vermeulen, last year. “Demand is sky-high and we’re having to turn
people away, which I don’t like doing.”

The boom in vinyl sales is attributed to two factors: older
generations who have long been attached to the format, and also a
younger audience used to digital forms of music who want to own a
physical format; with CDs in decline, vinyl has become a popular
alternative.

“A lot of young people buy songs that they hear and love on streaming
services,” said Michinori Mizuno, chief executive of Sony Music Japan.

Factory worker Aga Dolega-Lawry places a master record
into a pressing machine to make copies of Definitely Maybe by Oasis at
The Vinyl Factory in Hayes, UK. Photograph: Chris J Ratcliffe/Getty
Images

The decision by Sony to invest in its own vinyl-pressing plant is
currently limited to Japan. The records released will primarily be older
Japanese reissues, and some new albums, and the records will mainly be
sold in that country.

Nonetheless, the decision has wider implications for the global music
industry, which has experienced a surprisingly fast reversal of
fortunes this year thanks to the phenomenon of streaming and the
worldwide clamour for vinyl.

The surge in demand for vinyl in the UK and Europe, propelled by
events such as Record Store Day, has put enormous pressure on few
remaining pressing plants. If sales continue to climb – 3.2m vinyl
records were sold in the UK in 2016, up 53% on the year before – Sony
may not be the only label wanting its own manufacturing plants, as was
common practice in the 1970s and 1980s.

Mark Mulligan, a music industry analyst, is not surprised by Sony’s
move. “There’s no doubt vinyl is a market that will keep growing – even
now globally there’s not enough capacity for making vinyl to meet the
demand,” he said. “As a result the pressing plants can charge the labels
a really high premium. So there may well be a profit incentive for more
labels to reopen their own plants.”

However, Mulligan said the move would “require a lot of investment,
not just in materials but also in expertise, training people up”.

“At the moment, consumers are willing to pay a high premium for vinyl
– people will happily pay £40 for a limited edition record – and so
labels are still making a wide profit margin. But if demand continues to
rise, I can see labels wanting to take control of their own destiny
when it comes to producing vinyl, so this may be repeated by others in
the future. It’s all tied in to supply and demand.” Fittingly, Record Industry is based in an old Sony Records vinyl
plant bought in 1998 by Vermeulen, a Dutch former DJ, to press dance
records. After a tricky patch seven years ago, the plant is on course to
press 11m records this year – more than double the amount pressed in
2014. About 60% were reissues of old music but new records pressed in
the factory included recordings by Jamiroquai, Lady Gaga and Beth Ditto.

Sales manager Anouk Rijnders said she was not worried by Sony’s move
to press its own vinyl as it was primarily for the Asian market.

“For us it’s not a concern ... I don’t expect huge levels of
production from them for at least the first few years,” she said. “We
produce 40,000 to 50,000 records a day, but making vinyl is a very
delicate process you need the people and the knowledge to do it, so I
think they might struggle with that.

“I do think we are expecting to see vinyl sales rise for another two
or years. It is not a passing fad, I think the return of vinyl is
something that will continue for years to come.”

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About Me

This is a blog about what interests me. Here you will find stories on animals, including animal rights material, cute stuff, and random informative posts about weird, beautiful and interesting creatures. Horses, Spotted Hyenas, and Border Collies will make regular appearances.
Also prominently featured will be posts about the Arts. Animation, photography, and the traditional forms, plus "outsider art," film and books.
Other things that will surface here are Japan & the Japanese, John Oliver, surfing, skateboarding and My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, interesting places and structures,and my own art, writing and photography.
There will be rants. It's an election year, and I am beginning to have a political dimension to my personality. I am also horrified at the level of injustice and violence visited upon people here in the US and elsewhere - particularly against people of color, immigrants, and the LGBT community. Some of these stories will be very hard to read, but I believe we must read them to keep ourselves mindful of the racist and vicious things that happen every day, to speak out when we see discrimination, and root out its evil from ourselves.